y hate this poor girl?"

"Far from it, my lady; none of them knew her before she came here. They
were at first struck with her appearance. Her features, although of
singular beauty, are, if I may so express myself, covered with a
touching and sickly paleness; and this melancholy and gentle countenance
at first inspired them with more interest than jealousy. Then she is
very silent, another source of surprise for these creatures, who, for
the most part, always endeavour to banish thought by making a noise,
talking, and moving about. In fact, although reserved and retiring, she
showed herself compassionate, which prevented her companions from taking
offence at her coldness of manner. This is not all: about a month since,
an intractable creature, nicknamed La Louve (the she-wolf), such is her
violent and brutal character, became a resident here. She is a woman of
twenty years of age, tall, masculine, with good-looking but strongly
marked features, and we are sometimes compelled to place her in the
black-hole to subdue her violence. The day before yesterday, only, she
came out of the cell, still irritated at the punishment she had
undergone; it was meal-time, the poor girl of whom I speak could not
eat, and said, sorrowfully, to her companions, 'Who will have my bread?'
'I will!' said La Louve. 'I will!' then said a creature almost deformed,
called Mont Saint-Jean, who is the laughing-stock and, sometimes in
spite of us, the butt of the other prisoners, although several months
advanced in pregnancy. The young girl gave her bread to this latter, to
the extreme anger of La Louve. 'It was I who asked you for the allowance
first!' she exclaimed, furiously. 'That is true; but this poor woman is
about to become a mother, and wants it more than you do,' replied the
young girl. La Louve, notwithstanding, snatched the bread from the hands
of Mont Saint-Jean, and began to wave her knife about, and to vociferate
loudly. As she is very evil-disposed and much feared, no one dared take
the part of the poor Goualeuse, although all the prisoners silently
sided with her."

"What do you call her name, madame?"

"La Goualeuse; it is the name, or rather the nickname, under which they
brought her here who is my protegee, and will, I hope, my lady, soon be
yours. Almost all of them have borrowed names."

"This is a very singular one."

"It signifies in their horrid jargon 'the singer,' for the young girl
has, they told me, a very delightful